• Born: 1065/6
• Married: Abt 1078
• Died: 19 Feb 1123

  Research Notes:

The Alexeiad records that Eirene, mother of Anna Komnene, was "kinswoman" of the Doukas family and "legal wife of my [Anna Komnene's] father" but does not name her parents. This passage follows soon after the text which names Mikhael and Ioannes as grandsons of "the Cæsar Ioannes" and "Georgios Palaiologos the husband of their sister". The omission of Eirene from this list of brothers and sister suggests that she was not the daughter of Andronikos Doukas. In another passage, the Alexeiad records that Anna "on my mother's side [was] related to the Doukas". Any doubts about her parentage are resolved in a further passage which records that, at the time of the Komnenoi rebellion in 1081, the future Emperor Alexios left "his wife, fifteen years old at the time…in the 'lower' palace with her sisters and mother and the Cæsar, her grandfather on the paternal side", and in yet another passage which explicitly states that she was "a daughter of Andronikos, the Cæsar's eldest son". Nikeforos Bryennios records that "Alexium Comnenum" married "primogenitam…filiarum" of Andronikos. The Alexeiad records that she was crowned empress "on the seventh day after the public proclamation" of her husband's accession. She supported her daughter's attempt to have the latter's husband Nikeforos Briennios succeed her husband as emperor, but retired to a convent after her husband died.

There is some confusion relating to the date of death of Empress Eirene. Prodromos, in a poem addressed to the empress, lists (in chronological order) the deaths which had occurred in her family: “la protection des Romains, Alexis...un gendre très célèbre...Nicéphore...l’enfant d’Andronic...mais son épouse décéda auparavant...la prophyrogénète Eudocie” and adds that “tu as fait disparâitre deux fils en même temps, cruel Telkine, la vie d’Andronic et la vigueur d’Isaac. L’un erre aux extrémités de l’Anatolie, mort vivant...l’autre est parti dans l’occident ténébreux de l’Hadès”. The latter part of the passage appears to refer to the death of Andronikos and the exile of Isaakios, both events dated to [1130/31]. This suggestion appears confirmed by the song composed by Mikhael Italicos after the death of Andronikos which records that “Irène Doukaina et le césar Nicéphore Bryennios” accompanied his body from the Asian bank back to Constantinople. Prodromos records that Empress Eirene was present at the funeral of Gregorios Kamateros which he says was foretold by the appearance of a comet, dated to 1126 or 14 Aug 1132 (the latter date being favoured by Gautier as he points out that the passage follows a reference to the summer being very dry, which was apparently the case in 1132). The typikon of Isaakios Komnenos (dated [1151/52]) records that Empress Eirene died “à la première indiction dix-neuvième jour de février”, identified by Gautier as the first year of the indiction (=[1137/38]) during which the monastery of Kosmoteira was founded ([1151/52]), and adds in the same sentence that “mon père et basileus a quitté ce monde le quinzième [jour] d’août, cinquième jour”. However, the Alexeiad confirms that the empress died before her son-in-law Nikeforos Bryennios (dated to [1136/37]...), when recording the deaths (in that order) of "the great Alexius...the Empress Irene...the Caesar [her husband]", but gives no further indication to enable the events to be dated. In addition, the obituary of the typikon of Kosmoteira (dated Oct 1136) records “tes makariotates despoines kai metros tes basileias mou”, the word “makariotates” being applied in the source to the individuals named who were deceased at the time (μακαρίτης = deceased). Chalandon concludes that the typikon of Isaakios Komnenos could not therefore refer to the indiction which started in 1137/38, excludes the previous indiction which started in 1122/23 because of the later sources which name the empress as living after that date, and suggests as a solution a transcription error in the typikon which should refer to the eleventh year of the previous indiction [1132/33]. Gautier highlights the anomaly in the typikon of Isaakios Komnenos which (as noted above) in the same sentence uses the indiction year for the empress’s death but the day of the week to date the death of her husband, suggests another transcription error whereby (in the case of the empress) a word indicating the first day of the week (Sunday) was misread as “indiction”, and adds that 1133 was the only year around that time when 19 Feb fell on a Sunday. Gautier concludes that, in light of all these considerations, 1133 is the best possibility for the date of the empress’s death, but notes that the speculations concerning the transcript of the typikon of Isaakios Komnenos cannot now be checked against the original manuscript as it no longer survives. ¹